"Did you discover anything?" Julius asked his sister, who was just flying down to them in a golden light. She nodded. "There was definitely a fight there, not far from here."
"Where?" Julius asked. Only a second ago, he had been having a short conversation with Eleanor and Nero. He had probed a little into their past, but Eleanor was as silent as always, while Nero only answered evasively. In any case, it was clear that they were hiding something. Zyta had briefly flown into the air to get an overview.
"About two kilometers in that direction!" she answered and pointed north.
"Then let us go there," Julius decided. He went ahead, closely followed by Zyta, Nero, and Eleanor. Nero looked around curiously, as if he were actually watching for the smallest traces.
"So…" Julius began, "where were we?" he asked with a carefree tone, as if it were a completely normal conversation, though of course it was no secret that he was probing the two.
"You were just telling us about your childhood," Nero reminded him, though he sounded mentally absent.
"Ahhh, yes, exactly! We had a rather stressful childhood, because unfortunately, our mother was killed early on by a spy of the Reils. So, our father had to raise us alone, but as a high-ranking member of the Order, he was a very busy man. Because of that, we hardly ever saw him." Julius sighed heavily. "It was partly very difficult for my sister and me, but we managed. How was your childhood, my friend?" he asked and turned to Nero while continuing to walk backward. He did not stumble even once; instead, the roots and plants seemed to twist out of his way.
Nero directed his gaze at Julius. "I had no parents," Nero said only, without going further into it.
Julius was silent for a moment. "That must have been even harder," he said, with genuine sympathy.
Nero merely shrugged. "It made me what I am today."
Julius nodded thoughtfully. Then he looked at Eleanor. "And what about you?" he asked curiously.
Eleanor thought for a moment. "There is not much to say. I had a loving mother and a protective father, who raised me with love. Unfortunately, they died of the black poch a few years ago."
That surprised Julius, who turned around again. The black poch was one of the deadliest diseases that had ever raged on this planet. It had spread out from Krisalis across the three continents. No one knew its exact origin. Thousands of humans, Reils, and Lizzians had died from it. A cure had still not been found to this day, but the disease died out about a decade ago after the three races, in an extremely rare agreement, gathered the infected together and sent them to Krisalis, where they died.
Nero could not help being impressed. Eleanor told the perfect lie because there was no way to verify the truth of his statement, and it was not that unlikely. Many parents fled early from the area with their children when the plague began, but in some cases, they only sent their children away if they could not afford to leave their homeland themselves, because of work or other reasons, in the hope of seeing their children again when everything was over.
Nero had only read about this disease a few days ago in a book Eleanor had given him, with the statement that it might perhaps be useful to them.
Krisalis was an incredibly strange place, and the more Nero read about this place, the deeper the mystery behind it became. Dozens of sources reported completely different landscapes, vegetations, plants, and trees, and yet they all claimed to describe Krisalis. It was as if the landscape of Krisalis were changing, just as ordinary trees shed their leaves when autumn came, blossomed in spring, and stood bare in winter.
But of course, this was not the only reason why Eleanor believed the information about the disease was important, because if they handled it correctly and could recover still infected corpses from the mass graves, they could perhaps spread the plague again.
So Nero added this to his mental list of different possibilities. But this tactic, too, required Nero to get to Krisalis. That was the true challenge, because Krisalis was obviously the best guarded place in this world.
"Anyways," Julius said, interrupting Nero's thoughts. "But our childhood changed abruptly when it turned out that my sister and I had strong magical potential. We had been told early on that the probability was high, since, as you surely know, magic is hereditary, but it still came as a surprise, especially for us two, who at that time were only nine years old. Suddenly, we were not only learning writing, reading, arithmetic, and other normal subjects, but we were also instructed in the art of magic. When did you find out that you had magic?"
For the first time, Nero did not know what to answer. The problem was that he had almost no knowledge of how humans on this planet received magic, since it did not seem to be consistent. But such a high-ranking person as Julius surely knew every way to obtain magic. But then Nero realized something.
"I was very young," he then told him. "I worked in a mine, where I then found a small black stone that gave me magic."
Julius stopped, with a frown but interested shining eyes, and turned back to Nero. "What kind of stone?"
Nero shrugged. "I cannot tell you that. It was a tiny little crystal that was buried deep inside the mountain. It accidentally fell down when I wanted to carry it to my…holder, but then it fell from my hand. It broke apart like glass, though not into small shards, but into black smoke, which entered my body. I cannot tell you more than that. As I said, I was still very young at that time, barely seven or eight years old."
"In which mine?" Zyta now asked as well, involving herself in the conversation for the first time. Nero only shrugged again.
"Do you at least remember the mountain? Or a city nearby?"
Nero tilted his head to the side as if thinking about it. Of course, he knew exactly what the mountain was called, and also the largest city nearby, but those names meant nothing in this world.
"Yes…" he said anyway. "Uld was nearby, because from there I was sold into the mine, which, as far as I know, was in a mountain of the Skypiercer range."
"Which mountain?" Zyta asked, growing impatient. The Skypiercer mountain range was the largest mountain chain of Huma, stretching almost across the entire continent. Hundreds, if not thousands, of mines had been and still were in operation in those mountains. Saying Nero had been at one of those mountains was the same as saying a shell was on some beach. It hardly helped to narrow down the exact place.
But Nero only shrugged. "I no longer remember the name."
Zyta growled angrily, but Julius calmed her. "That is alright. It makes sense that you can no longer remember it, but I have never heard of such a black stone that can give someone magic. Normally, you simply perform the awakening ritual. But that explains why we have never heard of you or your kind of magic, because during the normal awakening ritual, at least one member of the Order must be present."
Nero simply smiled. Inwardly, he breathed out. He already knew that his magic seemed to be somewhat unique in this world. So there was no reason to lie. He simply told a slightly altered version of the true story of how he got magic. There was no way for Julius to verify it, because Nero's magic was unknown. Anything could be true.
But this triggered something new in Julius. If Nero's story was true, and if there were more of these black crystals he spoke of, then this could be revolutionary. Nero's strength was incredibly powerful; that much Julius had already heard from Kia's reports, but if this could give magic to non-mages, which was only a theory of Julius, since he possessed too little information, then it could change the entire balance of power between the three races. If they began turning mortal humans into mages, it would not take a decade before they could defeat the other two races alone.
Nero could not see Julius's expression, but he could, of course, guess the younger man's thoughts; after all, the exact same thoughts would be going through his own head. To be honest, Nero did not know whether the crystal had only activated his magic or whether it had actually given him magic.
Lost in thought, the group continued in complete silence. Julius was so distracted by Nero's story that he forgot to ask Eleanor how he had obtained magic, and luckily, they arrived at their destination before he could realize it. The first thing that stood out was cracks running through the ground. Then fallen trees, destroyed treetops, dead, rotting corpses of animals that had been involuntarily killed in the fight. Then they reached a place where everything had been destroyed. As if swept aside by a gigantic wave, there was a huge circle here in which not a single blade of grass still stood, not a single tree still had roots, and no animal moved. The entire ground was covered by a strange layer of metal that gleamed in the bright sun.
"What happened here?" Eleanor asked, looking around the clearing in surprise. Of course, he knew what had happened here, but he played his role. Inwardly, he used his magic to look around. Surprisingly, remnants of magic still hung in the air, though so weakly that they could barely be perceived.
Julius looked around curiously. He bent forward. Carefully, he ran his finger over the layer of metal. "That was clearly Tark…" he murmured. "He was a metal mage after all. Apparently, he fought here against an extremely strong opponent."